My mom has always been, above all things, a control freak. This, combined with her obsessive need for time efficiency, psychotic over planning, and hysterical misinterpretation of the importance of details - all of which I was lucky enough to inherit - means that in the weeks preceding the wedding, she completely loses her mind. With two weeks and six days left before the wedding, she shakes me away when it’s still dark outside.

“Ushers,” she hisses. My eyes are still half-glued shut with sleep, and I have to hold my watch an inch from my face to see the time.

“Mom?” I say hoarsely. “It’s three thirty in the morning, what’s wrong?”

“Ushers! There aren’t enough ushers! I have two hundred and thirty-three people coming to this wedding and only three ushers!” she shrieks. I clamp my pillow down over my head.

“Mom, you can hire ushers. Call Heather and tell her to get you a bunch of matching J. Crew models. That’s why you hired a wedding planner in the first place. Let me go back to sleep,” I grumble. Mom seizes my pillow and flings it across the room.

“I don’t want strangers as my ushers! This is supposed to be a day for family and close friends!” she says.

“Yeah, all two hundred and thirty-three of them.”

“Call your friends, Travis, I need them all to-”

“Mom, you hate all of my friends, except for the two you’ve already recruited. They’re all scruffy emo kids. Trust me, it’ll be fine with three,” I say, groping around for another pillow. My fingers finally brush against one, but Mom tears it away and throws the lights on. I burrow under my blankets, groaning. “Mom, fuck off.”

“Travis, I expect you to be waiting outside your school at two fifteen, well… let’s see, today is too short notice, and tomorrow you’re working, correct? Correct. But I suppose Friday should work. Anyway, I expect you outside your school at quarter after two with all of those boys you hang out with. Corey and Miles-”

“You were making them be ushers anyway,” I interrupt.

“Ben, Alex, Jason, and… well, that other boy. The one with the unfortunate floppy hair who should really try to smoke less marijuana, he absolutely reeks of it.”

“See, this is why you only met these people yesterday, even though I’ve been hanging out with them for months. There is no Jason, by the way. His name is Jeremy,” I say. I poke my head out from under the blankets to see Mom massaging her temples.

“Travis, they both begin with the letter ‘J’ and are therefore practically the same name, for all I care. Please just be outside the building at two fifteen,” she says through gritted teeth.

“No, Mom. I realize that you’re clearly sleep-deprived and half-crazy. But trust me, you do not want my friends as your wedding ushers,” I say.

“Well, I don’t have much of a choice, do I? Six ushers is barely enough, given the crowd we’re expecting, but you obviously won’t be an usher now that you’re the best man instead of Garen. That’s why I remembered this whole thing to begin with. Thinking about him, of course,” she says, almost absently. I sit up so sharply that she actually bothers to look at me, mildly surprised.

“Why were you thinking about him? Why ‘of course’?” I ask. She stares at me.

“Don’t you know what today is?” she says. I grab my cell phone off the nightstand and flip it open to check the date. March twenty-seventh. Garen’s birthday.

“Oh,” I say mildly. Mom pauses, then pats my arm awkwardly.

“I’m sorry for bringing it up,” she says, the words only sound half-sincere. As of today, Garen can vote (if he can decide whether he’s a resident of New York or Connecticut), get married (in whatever states would allow it), join the Army (as long as they don’t ask and he doesn’t tell), buy cigarettes (again), get (more) tattoos, and get into clubs (without having to pay off and/or blow the bouncer). I snap the phone shut and shake my head quickly.

“I don’t even care. I just… I’d forgotten, I guess. B-But it’s not important. So, wait, why am I supposed to meet you outside school this week?” I say.

“Because I need your friends to all have matching suits if-”

“They’re not going to be ushers, Mom, please step out of that fantasy. And please let me go to sleep,” I say, failing to stifle a yawn. Mom shoots me a final withering look, but leaves anyway. I crawl out of bed to turn off the light and fetch my pillow before curling up under the blankets and passing out once more.

The whole experience makes for an amusing story at lunch on Monday, when I’m still trying not to think about Garen’s stupid birthday or fall asleep in mid-bite. By Tuesday morning, I’ve forgotten about it, because Mom has already moved onto the next psychotic episode and set up an easel with the seating chart in the kitchen. When Friday finally comes around, I’ve completely forgotten about Mom’s demands to meet up with my friends and I. I’m too busy trying to figure out how to tell her that she’ll only be having five ushers after all.

“She’s going to kill me,” I sigh, slouching down a little more on one of the wooden benches outside the school. Ben, who is sitting on my lap, straddling my hips, has to adjust quickly to avoid hitting the sidewalk.

“She is not. I mean, she might kill Miles, but not you,” he says. Jeremy hums in agreement.

“Two weeks, two days,” I correct. “Maybe I could convince him to change his mind? It’s a dick move to have agreed months ago and then just be backing out now because his girlfriend became a bitch.”

“What’s the story with that, anyway?” Alex asks, stretching his long legs out and slouching down on the bench next to me as well.

“Basically, Faye is okay with Travis the Fag in theory, but is kind of squeamish about the whole situation now that Travis the Fag is publicly dating Ben the Fag,” Ben murmurs.

“Okay, one? It’s weird to talk about yourself in the third person. Two? Maybe she’d have less of a problem with it if you guys would stop dry-humping each other in public every day,” Jeremy suggests. Ben gives him the finger and presses a kiss to my neck.

“We don’t dry-hump each other every day in public,” I protest. Mason snorts, and Jeremy rolls his eyes.

“Oh, sorry. I guess I just invented that part. I must’ve been confusing it with the making out before school in Ben’s car, and then in the hall before homeroom-”

“And then whenever you run into each other between classes-”

“And before lunch-”

“And after lunch-”

“And sometimes during lunch, which is just a whole other level of disturbing-”

“I think you guys have made your point,” I say loudly. “And that’s not what Faye’s problem is. She just… well, according to Miles, she ‘doesn’t like my new reputation.’”

“Meaning she doesn’t like the fact that you went from this uptight, asexual eunuch to being a complete exhibitionist?” Mason asks. I open my mouth to reply, but Alex shakes his head and cuts across me.

“No, meaning she has felt awkward being friends with him ever since the whole school started talking about that time his dick was in my mouth,” he says. Ben stiffens slightly, even as Jeremy and Mason both chuckle.

“Can I just remind everyone that we’re talking about my boyfriend here?” he says. Alex sticks his tongue out at him.

“Well, if it bothers you, maybe you should stop going after my sloppy seconds,” he pauses, then turns his head towards me. “Or, are you technically sloppy thirds? ‘Cause I mean, I guess I had Garen’s sloppy seconds, and now Ben’s getting my sloppy seconds and Garen’s sloppy thirds?”

“I really resent the use of the word ‘sloppy’ in regards to my sex life,” I say. He shrugs.

“Just using the expression. And I’m not saying anything that’s untrue, am I? I’m just discussing the timeline. Garen blew you first. Then I did. That makes him first, me second. Right?” he says. I snort.

“If you can even count what happened between you and I as a blowjob,” I say.

“Ouch,” Mason murmurs.

“Fuck you, McCall, I give great head,” Alex protests, and I grin.

“I only meant that it lasted about ten seconds,” I say, and Ben looks around at me in mild surprise.

“Is that really all it takes you? God, if I’d known that, I might not’ve been so quick to date you,” he says. I cuff him lightly around the head.

“No, that is not how long it takes me. I only meant that I stopped him from doing it after a few seconds because it felt wrong.”

“Take that back, Travis,” Alex orders, and then he adds to the others, “He’s so full of shit. I can suck cock like it’s my job-”

“Alex, you were so wasted I’m surprised you didn’t throw up on my-”

“Travis Daniel McCall!”

Ben jolts so suddenly that he almost falls off my lap. I manage to catch him before he actually hits the ground, but a second later, when we both follow the voice over to the SUV idling a few feet away and see my mother sitting in the driver’s seat, he scampers off my lap, straightening his clothes and turning a deep shade of red.

“Mom? What the hell are you doing here?” I ask.

“I told you I was picking you and your friends up. Did you think I was joking? I only see four other people, Travis. Where are Corey and Miles? Where are my last two ushers?” Mom demands, cutting the ignition and getting out of the car. She is dressed in a tailored white suit, the same kind of outfit she’s been wearing constantly lately. Apparently, she’s trying to look simultaneously “business” and “bridal.”

“I thought you were joking about that!” I hiss. She glowers at me. I roll my eyes and look around at the guys. “Guys, please tell my mother that you will not be going to her wedding.”

“Well, why not? Benjamin is supposed to be going as your date anyway, God knows you fought that battle with enough gusto, but I need ushers, so if your friends aren’t busy that day, then why not?” Mom says. Ben blinks at me, and Mason chuckles, echoing under his breath, “Benjamin.”

“You want me to be your date to the wedding?” Ben says.

“Travis Daniel, when this entire thing is over, you are grounded! You were so adamant that you be allowed to invite him to the wedding, you absolutely refused to participate unless you could invite your boyfriend, and now I find out you haven’t even asked him?” she says. I open my mouth to reply, but she turns towards Ben, who flinches. “Ben, would you like to be my son’s date to the wedding? It’s two weeks from this coming Sunday, and he would love to have you there, but is apparently not enough of a man to invite you himself.”

“Did your mom just say you have no sack?” Jeremy asks me, and Alex bursts out laughing. Ben is blushing furiously, and seems incapable of speaking. Eventually, however, he nods and manages to force out, “Y-Yeah, okay. Thank you for inviting me.”

“Not at all, dear,” Mom says, and then she rounds on the others. “The ceremony begins at eleven o’clock, and I expect you all at the church no later than ten. Now, you-” she points at Mason, who blinks slowly “-do not look like you even know what a suit is. We’ll have to change that immediately. Furthermore, if you show up at my wedding as high as you are right now, I will have you shot.”

“Mother!” I yell, and she turns to me, unfazed.

“I’m not joking, Travis. This is a very serious matter. Now, everyone, stand up!” she cries, gesturing for us all to stand. None of us move. After a moment, a muscle in her forehead begins to twitch, so we all eventually scramble to our feet. “Get in the car! We’re going shopping, I need you all to match. Travis, find Corey and Miles immediately.”

“Um. About that,” I say. I try to explain to her about Miles not being an usher anymore, and the muscle twitches a little harder. I bolt back into the school to find Corey, if only so I don’t have to watch the explosion. Corey is walking down the hall in the sophomore wing, his arm around a pretty brunette girl. I skid to a stop in front of them.

“Corey, my mom’s here, and she’s going crazy. She’s taking you, me, and all my other friends out to buy us clothes, apparently, because now every guy I’ve ever met is an usher in her wedding,” I gasp out. Remember the girl, I turn to her and add, “Hi, I’m Travis.”

“Shelley,” she says, giving a small wave. Corey shakes his head.

“I can’t. I’m driving Shelley home,” he says. She turns to him quickly.

“No, it’s okay. I can get a ride from someone else,” she protests.

“Shelley, you can come along, for all I care, but if Corey and I aren’t outside and in my mom’s car in about ten seconds, none of us will live to see eighteen,” I say. I turn on my heel and bolt back outside, the two of them trailing after me. Outside, Mom is arguing with Jeremy about the physics of fitting this many people into an SUV.

“Mrs. McCall, I’m really sorry, I just don’t see how you expect us all to fit. It seats one driver and four passengers. I’m sure if we took another car, we could follow you-”

“No! I am not letting any of you out of my sight! There aren’t really that many of you, I’m sure we can all fit,” she says. She spots us, and beams.

“Corey, how nice to see you again!”

“Hi, Mrs. McCall. This is my girlfriend, Shelley. I’m supposed to give her a ride home, but Travis said it’d be okay if she came too,” Corey says.

“Of course! I have a plan, you see,” she announces. “Jeremy, Mason, and Corey. You all seem to be roughly the same size, and, well, it won’t be comfortable, but you can all fit in the back together. Go on!”

The three of them clamber into the car awkwardly, trying to make themselves as small as possible, but failing miserably, considering they’re all about five eleven. Mom turns to Alex and surveys him mournfully.

“Good God, Alex. How tall are you?” she asks. He shrugs.

“About six two?” he says. She seizes his shoulder and shoves him towards the front of the car.

“There’s no way you’ll fit in the back, so you can sit up front. Travis, you go with him, you’re too tall to fit in the back, too,” she says. I blink at her.

“Mom, there’s only one seat up front,” I say as I get in the car.

“So sit on his lap, for Christ’s sake, Travis!” Mom shouts, and a few passing freshmen hurry away, looking alarmed. “You’re always telling me how gay you are, how much you like men, how you are just this special rainbow of homosexual impulses, and if that’s true, then you will get in that car and get on top of your friend!”

“Then I guess it’s fortunate for you that I’m not telling him to molest you. Please get in the car, Alex,” Mom says sharply. Alex hastily climbs into the seat with me, and Mom slams the door after him. In order to actually fit both of us, I am on the absolute edge of the seat, and Alex is twisted so he’s half-facing me, his right leg somewhat on top of mine. All in all, it’s significantly awkward.

“Let’s see. Yes, Shelley, that should work fine,” Mom says, and I twist to look. Shelley has joined the mess in the back seat and is the only one who looks comfortable from where she is on Corey’s lap. I catch her eye, and she grins at me. Clearly, this is an adventure for her. Ben peers into the backseat, then gestures off towards his own SUV.

“You know, I really can just follow you guys,” he says.

“Nonsense, Benjamin. You’re very small, you should fit in nicely,” Mom replies. Ben opens his mouth to speak, but the words die in his mouth as my mom lifts him off the ground and flings him into the backseat. He’s halfway on top of Mason, half on Jeremy, but Mom looks satisfied and slams the door shut.

“There! See? I told you it would work out well!” she says, smiling at us as she gets into the car, turns it on, and guns it out of the school parking lot.

“Mom, just… I don’t even…” I sigh. “Where are we going?”

“Store,” Mom says flatly. I don’t really want to bother trying to disrupt her thought process, so I drop it.

“So, what’s the wedding going to be like, Mrs. McCall?” Shelley asks. Mom, clearly thrilled at another female taking interest in the topic, launches into her plans, going into way too much detail over her dress, the reception hall, the caterers. Alex sighs and lets his head loll sideways against the headrest. The awkward positioning puts his forehead just barely touching the side of my face and his breath slow and shaky on my neck. I nudge him.

“Are you feeling okay?” I whisper. He nods after a brief pause.

“Yeah, I’m great. My left arm’s just kind of crushed and falling asleep,” he says. I grab his wrist and try to rub some feeling back into it, but he yanks his arm back, twisting at a strange angle to do so. “It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.”

“Okaaaay,” I say, raising my eyebrows, but his eyes are closed, so he obviously doesn’t notice. His posture doesn’t relax at all, so halfway down the highway, I slip my phone out of my pocket and, holding it close to the side of my thigh so he won’t see it if he opens his eyes again, type to Ben’s phone, Alex is acting weird. What’s up with him lately? A second after sending it, I hear Ben’s phone beep. There’s a brief pause as he reads and types, and then my phone buzzes against my palm. I have no idea. I thought I was the only one who had noticed. Want me to try to talk to him once we’re out of the car? I glance over my shoulder, catch Ben’s eye, and nod once. Mom whips the car around into a parking lot and lurches to a stop, and my head snaps forward.

“Jesus, Mom, we’ve got nearly three weeks until the wedding. Not every single thing you do that’s related to it needs to be so dramatic,” I say.

“I don’t know how long this is going to take, and the store closes at five,” Mom says as the eight of us make our way into the formalwear store.

“Oh God, this cannot take even close to two and a half hours,” I groan. Mom gives me a warning look, then turn to the salesclerk, who greets her by name. Within half an hour, all measurements have been made and recorded. Within an hour of our arrival, my friends are all lined up in front of me, Mom, and Shelley. Each of them is dressed in a crisp black suit jacket, black pants, a shockingly white shirt, a vest and tie in what is apparently called “clover,” and unbelievably shiny black shoes. They all look very uncomfortable, but very, very good.

“Perfect,” Mom announces. Very few of her wedding plans so far have been actually perfect, but I don’t think any of the guys realize just how much of a compliment this is, coming from her. She smiles briefly in satisfaction, then goes to the back with the salesclerk to retrieve my tux, which had been ordered a month ago.

“Guys, you all look so amazing,” Shelley says, grinning. I nod.

“Yeah,” I say. Ben is the only one not facing us. Instead, he is facing one of the many floor-length mirrors, his head cocked to the side as he surveys himself. I can’t blame him, really; I can’t take my eyes off him either. He glances at me in the mirror and gives me a slightly quizzical look. I hadn’t realized I was watching him so intently. I clear my throat and say quietly, “You look really good.”

“Thank you,” he says, smiling slightly. We stare at each other for another minute - God his eyes are blue - and finally, he mouths, “I love you.” I grin and mouth, “I love you, too.”

“Do you need help?” Jeremy asks suddenly. I glance at him, but he’s addressing Alex, who is fiddling with one of his cufflinks.

“No, I just wanted to see if I could take it off and put it back on. You know, on my own. Just in case,” he says, and then he looks back at me. “Why aren’t you matching us?”

“Because I’m not an usher anymore. I was supposed to be, I guess, back when Garen was going to be the best man. But not anymore,” I say. Alex’s eyes dart back to his cufflinks.

“Did you wish him a happy birthday?” he asks. Ben freezes, still facing the mirror.

“What?” I say softly. Alex spares me the briefest glance.

“Garen. Did you call and wish him a happy birthday? It was on Monday. I thought you remembered,” he says. Corey clears his throat pointedly, but I ignore him.

“Of course I remembered. But I haven’t talked to him since he left. Why would I call him?” I ask. Alex shrugs.

“I did,” he says. Ben twists sharply to face him.

“You did?” he says. Alex nods very slowly, still not looking at either of us.

“Yeah. We talked for about… half an hour, I guess. It was cool,” he says. He pauses, then adds, “Before you start freaking out, no. I didn’t tell him you guys are together now.”

“Wait,” Jeremy says, turning to Ben. “So, Garen doesn’t know? Like, he still thinks Travis is single and that you didn’t start dating his ex like, a month after he left?”

“And what about you?” Ben hisses, closing the distance between them in three steps. Despite the fact that he is eight inches shorter than Alex, he still looks pretty intimidating. “I may have started dating him after a while, but which one of us got fucking wasted and went down on him one month to the day after Garen left?”

“It’s not my fault you’re jealous I got there first,” Alex says flatly. Ben jerks back like Alex just punched him in the face. I stand up and slip between them, hooking an arm around Ben’s waist and pulling him a few feet away.

“Both of you, stop it. Right now,” I say. Ben digs two fingers under the cuff of his jacket and draws back one of the rubber bands on his wrist, letting it snap down hard against his skin. I clamp a hand over the elastics before he can do it again. “Ben. Ben, stop it.”

“Let go of me, Travis,” he says, but I just drag him further away from the others and catch his face between my hands.

“Listen to me. I don’t know what Alex’s problem is today, but everything he’s saying is just because he’s in a shitty mood. He doesn’t really mean it. He doesn’t give a shit that you and I are dating, and he doesn’t think we’re being assholes to Garen. He doesn’t think you’re jealous that he… you know, that he and I hooked up before you and I got together.”

“What if I am?” Ben says, his voice heavy with a misery I hadn’t anticipated at all. “What if I’m tired of never getting all of someone? Because, you know, I never got all of Ethan - fuck, I never wanted all of Ethan, but still - and I never got all of Garen, because he was yours from the first second you looked at him, and n-now there’s you, but you had Garen, and Alex, and I don’t-”

“Stop it,” I interrupt. “Listen, Ben. You know that what happened between Alex and I was just a random drunken hookup, and you know he’s just bringing it up to piss you off for whatever reason. And Garen… look. Garen was my first everything. The first guy I kissed, the first guy I slept with, the first guy I fell in love with. But everybody has a first, and most of the time, the first isn’t the only. My relationship with him is over. It’s in the past. And you’re right here, you’re in the present, and you’re going to be in my future, too. I wasn’t joking when I told you I love you. I meant it. I mean it.”

Ben doesn’t speak for several minutes. He stand completely still, his eyes on the ground, and for a little while, I start to worry that he’s going catatonic. Eventually, however, he slowly raises his eyes to mine and nods.

The car ride back to the school is silent except for Mom’s endless babbling. Mason wordlessly takes my seat up front with Alex, and I flash him a small, grateful smile before sliding into the backseat with Ben on my lap. The general sense of awkwardness doesn’t bother me, but Ben’s refusal to make a sound, his rigid posture and the occasional, deliberate snap of the rubber band on his wrist… that bothers me. I wrap my arms around him as tightly as I think he’ll stand and kiss his neck softly.

“Please don’t be sad,” I whisper. He shakes his head and huddles closer to my chest. Each one of my mom’s sentences seems to be punctuated by the snap of the rubber band, and by the time we pull into the school parking lot and I get out to walk Ben to his car, I can see that his wrist is red and swollen under the streetlight.

By the following Friday, everything is back to normal. I don’t pretend to understand it.